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Margaret Thatcher put steel into Canada’s constitutional architecture

Thatcher gave her word that whether or not there was provincial unanimity she would support Ottawa’s constitutional package.

Pierre Trudeau had to work with Margaret Thatcher to reform Canada's Constitution. (Oct. 4, 1981) (PETER BREGG / THE CANADIAN PRESS)

By Thomas S. Axworthy

Tues., April 9, 2013

In her passing, Margaret Thatcher is being described as Great Britain’s greatest 20th century peacetime prime minister. She also has a special place in Canadian history, though this may be unknown to many of her admirers.

Working with Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, I was privileged to meet many world leaders. Three stood out for the immediate impact they made: Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore, Helmut Schmidt of Germany and Margaret Thatcher of Great Britain.

I first heard of Thatcher in the early 1970s, when I was a postgraduate student at Oxford. As education minister in the Conservative government of Edward Heath, she was known by many of my Labour friends as “Thatcher the milk snatcher” for her efforts to reduce benefits. Following her decision to contest the Conservative party leadership when many prominent Conservatives had decided not to take the risk, she not only articulated a point of view, but actually won enough support to become leader. With Britain convulsed by strikes and economic decline, it was a relatively easy task to defeat the Labour government in 1979.

Having followed her career closely, I was not disappointed when I met Margaret Thatcher in person. Though neither would like the comparison, I thought she had great similarities to Trudeau. Both had an explicit, though radically opposed, philosophical framework through which they filtered ideas and programs. Both were demon debaters: at G-7 meetings, U.S. president Ronald Reagan would generally open a meeting with a funny anecdote, and then sit back as Thatcher and Trudeau debated hammer and tongs.

“The lady’s not for turning,” Thatcher famously told her party when many wondered if her economic policy would lead to political disaster, and on fundamental issues like the Charter of Rights, Trudeau was “not for turning” either.

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In 1980 after Trudeau returned to office, he almost immediately fought and won the Quebec referendum and announced an audacious plan to patriate the Constitution — at the time still subject to the legal requirement that amendments would have to be eventually passed by the British Parliament. This made it necessary for Trudeau to establish quickly a working relationship with the new prime minister of Great Britain. Trudeau met Thatcher on June 25, 1980, and immediately presented her with a tricky political problem.

Thatcher told Trudeau that Britain did not want to be “accused of interfering” and that it would be difficult to proceed if Canada was not “united in its approach.” Trudeau, however, was forthright in advising that there was no chance for unanimity and that Britain “would be accused of interfering, whichever way things went.” So Trudeau gave Thatcher a hot potato she didn’t need. But critically, Thatcher also gave her word that whether or not there was provincial unanimity she would support the Government of Canada’s package and was prepared to give this commitment publicly.

Trudeau’s patriation package was based on the logic that, one last time, Ottawa would go to Britain to amend the Constitution. Thatcher’s public commitment to this strategy sustained Trudeau through the long months of negotiation with the provinces. As it turned out, the success of the November 1981 federal-provincial conference in agreeing to patriation (with the exception of the Province of Quebec) greatly eased Thatcher’s subsequent task. But her early commitment was a key component in building support for Trudeau’s plan.

Thatcher was more than just an Iron Lady. In June 1984, for example, upon arriving at 10 Downing Street for a meeting, Thatcher met our party at the door and then took the time to point out pictures of past prime ministers and made us all feel at ease in her home. She was a perfect hostess.

Margaret Thatcher was a conviction politician. She believed responsibilities were as important as rights. She believed that morality should be part of foreign policy. She believed that markets alone produce wealth. Most of all, she believed in keeping her word. When she committed, she stayed committed. Luckily for Canada, she gave her word to present, one last time, a set of constitutional amendments to the British Parliament and in this, she never wavered. The Iron Lady lent some steel to Canada’s constitutional architecture.

Thomas S. Axworthy is a senior distinguished fellow at the Munk School of Global Affairs and a senior fellow at Massey College.

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